Well, Beth, over at Beth Fish Reads has given us a wonderful holiday gift: Permission to unplug from the computer during the upcoming frantic, hectic holiday period. My husband will attest that annually, sometime during the next week, I will go into emotional melt-down over
- Not having my whole family together for the entire 6 week holiday period
- The tree
- what size
- where do we put it?
- real (we live in Maine for godsakes and have 32 acres of pine trees!!!) or fake (much easier and we don't have to kill one of our babies)
- How many? (we have enough ornaments to do 5 good sized trees)
- The baking
- how much
- what
- The presents
- who to get what for
- online and send directly to out of town? or shop locally and go thru the hassle (it used to be fun!) of wrapping and mailing
- Cards
- Are we going to do them?
- Do an Annual christmas letter (don't people already know enough from the blog and the Facebook accounts?)
- who's doing them?
- Wreaths
- we have 9 windows and 2 doors - and the wreaths look gorgeous in the snow (we've had a white Christmas every year since we've been here) but we have to take the screens down for the full effect and that's a bummer with my arthritis and the cold temps. Hubbie has enough to do with all the wood chopping, and other chores, but, they look so pretty...........
- Finishing my various annual book challenges! This year except for ARcs waiting review, I'm on track to finish up what I signed up for. Next year I hope to get a better handle on the ARCs.
- Events - which caroling parties, tree lightings/trimmings, egg nog parties, Advent wreath makings should we attend. How much energy do we have.
Anyway, my darling daughter, (she who works in the information arena) showed me a wonderful add-on for those of us who use Mozilla Firefox as a browser. It's a little program called Leech-Block, and you can use it to set specific hours when you are allowed (or blocked) from getting onto Blogs, Facebooks, etc....I've downloaded it, but haven't yet had the courage to turn it on. I know I can get around it by simply using IE as a browser, but I detest IE, and that would be cheating, so if I can't completely unplug, I think I'll try the Leech blocker.
But thank you Beth. I for one welcome the opportunity to unplug and am challenging myself to do so. Now I just have to figure out when.............................
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32 acres and a white Christmas every year? Oh my...
ReplyDeleteNow I am so depressed I can hardly speak...
Ok,seriously, we all have to set limits, be it on our Christmas activities or our online time. It is all about balance, isn't it.
You are so right about the darkness though. When I work nights, which is 2-3 days every week and a half, all I see is darkness. I go home from work in the dark, go to sleep and when I wake up, it is dark again.
If I had to do it for more than 2 or 3 days at a time..it would be bad.
Well, I've already made my decisions...
ReplyDeleteTrees - 1 Small, 1 medium, 1 large all fake
baking - list decided- all I have to do is schedule what when
presents - gift certificates for the out of town kids (I know that's cheating but they love to go after Christmas for all the sales and get exactly what they want) the siblings have ceased to exchange except for nominal items, so that leaves one for Mom and 1 for hubbie
Cards are scheduled for the 2nd week in December
Parties are all scheduled, RSVPs done,
and decorations are in progress!
It's all in the organizatiin and having a calendar that can handle everything - yeah Outlook!
We miss you down here but know you'll love your NE Christmas!
XOXOX
Cheli---it's a good thing you're my baby sister, and I love you 'cause that kind of organization and everything done tude is exactly what I don't do....big loving raspberry to you (in public yet!)
ReplyDelete